About Us

As a Church made up of Christians from various backgrounds and denominations, including those both new to the faith and those familiar with it, we aim to practice and model a generous orthodoxy around what we believe together.

Our Pastor

Matthew Shedden

Matthew is the Chicago-born lead pastor at Defiance Church responsible for teaching, vision, and shepherding the community. He is passionate about inviting people into a transformative space of common worship together and letting that guide them in their daily lives. Matthew has a Masters of Divinity from the Seattle School of Theology and Psychology and has continued to enrich his understanding of who God is through the study the scriptures, Karl Barth, and Stanley Hauerwas. He and his wife, Kelli, along with their three children love to swim in the Hot Springs, ski Sunlight Mountain, fly fish, catch a baseball game,and cook pizza together nearly every Friday night.


Matthew would love to meet you if you are looking for a church or new to the Valley and treat you to a coffee or a pint.


Our Name

People of Community

Defiance connects us to the location where we are called to serve and worship with our neighbors. As the original name of our town, it locates us in our mission to be a people of light to those in the Roaring Fork Valley.

This is where we live and love.


People of Tradition

Defiance is a church born out of the radical reformation - a people who defied the dominant cultural forms of faith in their time. These Anabaptist communities held a theological and spiritual stance that refused to let violence be the last word in a world fractured by sin, violence, and fear. We are called to live differently - to live in a way that often stands at odds with what the world tells us is important. We live in God's wholeness with each other and extend this movement of peace out into the world.

This is our living history.


People of life

Defiance is a witness to the story that God, in Jesus Christ, defied death on a cross through resurrection. In a world bent on death, defiance is to be our stance as a people of life. It is core to our identity that Christ, through baptism, turns us away from paths of destruction toward a new direction and a new life. Because He lives, we are a people of resurrection who pray “your kingdom come”.

This is our hope.

About Us

Our DNA

We invite you to explore our common practices and beliefs that guide us. Witness is primary, the theological virtues (Faith, Hope, and Love) situate us in life, and the 5 distinctives lead our common life.

  • Witness

    “To be a witness of God does not consist in engaging in propaganda, nor even in stirring people up, but in being a living mystery. It means to live in such a way that one’s life would not make sense if God did not exist.” Cardinal Emmanuel Suhard

  • Faith, Hope, and Love

    And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

    These three, considered the theological virtues guide us in our witness and how we inhabit the world. Faith, we talk about as drawing us into God’s past acts in rescuing Israel from Egypt and raising Jesus from the dead. We also tell stories of how God has been there for us.

    Hope, we talk about guiding us into the future God has for us. The renewal of all things, the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come.

    Love, is the posture we take in the present as we called both into the particular love of the one God in three persons revealed in the scriptures and the particular love of our neighbor.

  • Word

    In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. John 1:1-5

  • Table

    While they were eating, Jesus took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to his disciples, saying, “Take and eat; this is my body.” Then he took a cup, and when he had given thanks, he gave it to them, saying, “Drink from it, all of you.

    Matthew 26:25-27


    At Defiance Church we come to gather around the Table. It sits at the end of our worship space and is where we share the body and the blood of our Lord which is given “for the life of the world.”

  • Confession

    At Defiance Church confession is both a practice in our regular worship in which we confess our sins to God but also in our confession of faith in the Apostles Creed. We then take as part of our witness to Confess the reality of what God has done in Jesus Christ and ourselves into the world.

  • Order

    "No one is obliged to take part in the spiritual crisis of a society; on the contrary, everyone is obliged to avoid this folly and live his life in order." Eric Voeglin


  • Tradition

    For I received from the Lord what I also passed on to you. 1 Corinthians 11:23


    “Tradition is the living faith of the dead, traditionalism is the dead faith of the living.” Jaroslav Pelikan


    For Tradition we see that what we believe and practice is not invented by us but handed down to us through the ages by the guidance of the Holy Spirit.

  • Baptism

    We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life. Romans 6:4


    Baptism in our entry into witness that God calls his church to be in the world. At Defiance Church we try to remind ourselves that the reality that is most true about us is that we’ve been baptized into Christ death and have been raised up to new life.


The Creeds

We stand together with Christians everywhere across the centuries that have embraced these basic statements of faith. These creeds form the core expression of our faith. At Defiance Church, these creeds are foundational for how we understand and express the truth of God’s story today.

  • The Apostles Creed

    We believe in God the Father: Almighty Creator of heaven and earth.


    We believe in Jesus Christ: God’s only Son, our Lord. Who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, Born of the Virgin Mary, Suffered under Pontius Pilate, Was crucified, died, and was buried; He descended to the dead. On the third day He rose again; He ascended into heaven, He is seated at the right hand of the Father, He will come again to judge the living and the dead.


    We believe in the Holy Spirit: The holy catholic Church, The communion of saints, The forgiveness of sins, The resurrection of the body, And the life everlasting. Amen.

  • The Nicene Creed

    We believe in one God, the Father almighty, maker of heaven and earth, of all things visible and invisible.


    And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only Son of God, begotten from the Father before all ages, God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not made; of the same essence as the Father.


    Through him all things were made. For us and for our salvation he came down from heaven; he became incarnate by the Holy Spirit and the virgin Mary, and was made human. He was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate; he suffered and was buried. The third day he rose again, according to the Scriptures. He ascended to heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father. He will come again with glory to judge the living and the dead. His kingdom will never end.


    And we believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life. He proceeds from the Father and the Son, and with the Father and the Son is worshiped and glorified. He spoke through the prophets. We believe in one holy catholic and apostolic church. We affirm one baptism for the forgiveness of sins. We look forward to the resurrection of the dead, and to life in the world to come.

    Amen.